Rambling with Rachel: And there he goes.

Well the time came my friends. Alex left to the MTC today and his adventure has begun! Was it hard saying goodbye to him? You bet! Will I miss him? Of course. Will I be okay? Yes.

We spent 9 am-12 am together on Monday and it was wonderful. We've made some precious memories in the short time before he left that I hope to treasure forever.

We planned on going to the Salt Lake temple together to do baptisms in the morning but I forgot to check on the "special dates" section of the website and when I called I was informed that they were closed. Bummer :( But we still went to Salt Lake and enjoyed ourselves. We wandered all over Temple square, which was nice because there wasn't a huge crowd of people there for once! We went to the top of the Joseph Smith building and walked on top of the conference center. We talked, laughed and reminisced as we enjoyed our last full day together.

We then went to Chick Fil'A for lunch (our favorite fast food place), hung out with his little brother and saw the new Mission Impossible movie with his family. (GOOD movie). I was feeling super anxious and nervous all day but tried not to let it show. After dinner and more time with his family we roasted marshmallows together by the fireplace. We roasted marshmallows on our first date so it was really special for us :)

The rest of the evening was filled with sweet words, hugs, kisses and tears (mostly from me.) He slow danced with me one last time and I couldn't fight the tears! I love him so much..
I thought I would only get a brief moment him the next day but ended up going to Maddox with him and his family. I was glad to get to spend more time with him but ended up getting pretty antsy because he was scheduled to get set apart at 7:30 and we were at the dang restaurant till 7 because we had to wait 2 hours just to get a table!! (Life lesson: Always call ahead when you eat at Maddox.) Thankfully, Alex's dad was able to call the stake president and get the appointment moved to 8:00 so he still had some time before. My heart was beating like crazy on the car ride home because I knew I had only 20 minutes left with my best friend!! But he was able to say goodbye to my family and there was not a dry eye in our family room. You can't tell in these pictures but I was crying during this time: It was such an exciting but sad moment.

Shortly after these were taken Alex and I stood on my front porch together and said our goodbyes. It was perhaps one of the hardest things I've ever had to do but it had to be done. He gave me a kiss and said he'd see me again on my porch in 2 years. He smiled, walked away and went off to become a missionary :)
I'm so so proud of him and can't wait to hear about all his experiences. He's going to be amazing!
To keep from missing me too much he asked for me to not say "I love you" or "I miss you" in my letters to him. That's gonna be hard but I'm gonna keep my promise on that. He knows what's in my heart anyway, he's my best friend!